A Marvel! – A New Beginning for Christmas – Purity 1828
Purity 1828 12/01/2025 Purity 1828 Audio Podcast
Purity 1828 on YouTube:
Good morning,
Today’s photo of a snow-covered field and a barn set aglow by Christmas lights while stars twinkle in an evening sky comes to us from yours truly as I captured this holiday scene this past Saturday as I was out walking the dog up Waite Rd.
Well, It’s Monday, December 1st, so it’s a new day, it’s a new month, and it’s a whole new season as we officially leave Thanksgiving and November behind to fully enter into the Christmas season where I hope we can make experience the joy of new beginnings and old traditions as we prepare our hearts for the celebration of incarnation of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
As for me I am hoping for full time job that will meet my financial needs under my Christmas tree this year and I am hoping to arrive at my Christmas celebrations feeling lighter, physically and emotionally, as I seek to shed the depressive feelings and extra weight that I have been carrying since suffering a work related injury in August and getting fired for it in November. There are a lot of things I would like to be free of by Christmas day, and I fully intend to press into the Lord’s presence and my identity in Christ to further surrender to the Lord’s will for my life.
This morning, I was reading Day 23 of The Chosen’s 40 Days with Jesus – Book Four devotional which asked:
Sometimes we acknowledge Jesus as Lord but still try and retain control of specific aspects of our lives (i.e. Finances, health, relationships, etc.), In what areas do you still need to make Jesus your Master, King, and Ruler?
This question prompted me to realize that I have really failed to let Jesus be my Master, King, and Ruler when it comes to what and how I eat (I eat things that I “know” aren’t healthy and I eat too much – for comfort or pleasure) and to what I allow myself to watch (I choose the trash of secular entertainment over the treasure of the things of God). So, I am going to kick off this Advent season with a fast of sorts – I will “fast” my bad behaviors. For the next 24 days, I am going to repent in these two areas of my life. It’s Christmas time, so it’s time to let Jesus rule these areas of my life and to agree to do what is “true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, and praiseworthy” (Phil 4:8) instead of doing what is “acceptable” according to the world. Although I consider myself a disciple of Jesus Christ, I haven’t let Jesus teach me how to surrender these things to Him. So, I am releasing these areas of my life to Him because I know that Jesus can do the impossible even if I can’t fully understand how He does it.
Speaking of not understand everything about Jesus, the Turning Point with Dr. David Jeremiah devotion for today talks about Jesus’s mysterious nature and I am sharing it on the blog today to remind us of just how special our Lord and Savior is.
“A MARVEL!
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. – John 1:14
Spider-Man, the Marvel Comics superhero introduced in 1962, is about a teenager who was bitten by a radioactive spider in a laboratory. The boy became a person with two natures—he is both human and spider. He can operate in both realms. But Spider-Man is fantasy. A person can only have one nature. We are humans.
Jesus Christ goes beyond our imaginations. He is God-Man. He is the only person who possesses two natures in one personality. He is Son of Man (human) and Son of God (divine). He is both God and human. It’s not a laboratory accident. It was God’s perfect plan for becoming one of us so He could atone for our sins by His suffering and death on the cross.
We can never fully understand the marvel of what Jesus did for us, but we can enter each day—including this one—thanking Him for it! – David Jeremiah
How necessary it was that Christ the Mediator, should be both God and man; for unless he had been man, he would not have been a fit sacrifice; and unless he had been God, that sacrifice would not have been of sufficient virtue. – William Ames
Amen. It’s December 1st, the second day of Advent, where we prepare our hearts for Christmas – where we remember how Christ was born and where we also look forward to His return. Jesus is like nobody else because He is fully God and fully man.
While Christ’s incarnation and “dual nature” is truly mysterious, and may be difficult to understand, it doesn’t have to be fully understood in order to for God’s grace to work in your life.
Without fully understanding it, we can accept, by faith, that Jesus is who He said He was – the Son of God and God the Son -, and put our trust in Him as Lord and Savior.
Similarly, we may never understand why God would choose to forgive us for simply putting our faith in Jesus, but we can accept, by faith, that it’s true.
Romans 10:9 tells us “… if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
It doesn’t say we have to fully understand Jesus’ nature, the Trinity, or God’s amazing grace, but when we simply believe what the Bible says about Jesus enough to put our trust in Him as Lord, it is enough to save us. Without perfect understanding, God is gracious enough to give us eternal life.
We don’t need to know or understand everything about Jesus and God’s plan to benefit from it. We simply need to believe and rejoice.
As David Jeremiah said above, “We can never fully understand the marvel of what Jesus did for us, but we can enter each day—including this one—thanking Him for it!”
So, if you have gotten past the fact that you may not understand everything about Jesus and put your faith in Him anyway, praise the Lord and Thank Him for His mercy, grace, and love that makes every day like Christmas!
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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple encouragements provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/.
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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling” By John G. Kruis.
(While Bible verses on various topics of Counseling can be found with a quick Google search, we encourage you to purchase this resource to support the late author’s work. (The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling By John G. Kruis on Amazon )
This morning’s meditation verses come from the section on Persecution.
1 Peter 3:13–22
1 Peter 3:13–14 (NIV) Who is going to harm you if you are eager to do good? But even if you should suffer for what is right, you are blessed. “Do not fear their threats; do not be frightened.”
Today’s verses are the first of two passages of scripture that fall under the twentieth point of our counseling reference guide resource section on Persecution.
20. Be willing to suffer even for doing good.
Today’s Bible verses encourage us to be bold and courageous when it comes to doing what it right according to the Lord. When put our faith in and follow Jesus, the Holy Spirit will guide us to do good works and to repent of our sinful behaviors and attitudes. But just because we find Jesus and try to finally do the right thing doesn’t mean that the world will applaud our efforts.
In my experience, I have discovered it can be quite the opposite as I have been insulted and lost relationships because of my faith. The world is still under the influence of Satan and those who don’t believe in Jesus are demonically opposed to Him and His followers.
SO, we have to be willing to continue to do the right thing and to do good for others, even in the face of persecution.
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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.com where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.
Today we continue sharing from “Day by Day Along the Way” By Jay E. Adams.
As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage you all to purchase Adams’ books for your own private study and to support the late author’s work. This resource is available online for less than $20 at many sites.
Day 327
He was enraged within as he looked at the city filled with idols. – Acts 17:16
When Jews from Thessalonica came to Berea to harass Paul and Silas, the brothers sent Paul away. Next we see him in Athens, alone, looking about the city and becoming more and more furious about the world’s so-called intellectual center filled with idols. And, indeed, he had many idols to observe: there were more idols in Athens than in all other Greek cities combined. It was said that it was easier to find an idol than a man in Athens. Paul was not entranced by the statuary; he was no tourist! It’s no wonder that later in his message on Mars Hill, he referred to what he had observed. He reasoned in the synagogue with Jews and debated with Greek philosophers in the marketplace. There he met the arguments of the Stoics and Epicureans who took him on (v. 18). They concluded that he taught about new gods and led him off to the council for a preliminary hearing about this matter. Paul, alone at Athens, was magnificent, as we shall see. But, before turning to the speech before the council, let me ask you, as a sightseer, would you take off your shoes to view the inside of the temple of a false religion? Paul wouldn’t. Should you?[1]
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[1] Jay E. Adams, Day by Day along the Way (Cordova, TN: Institute for Nouthetic Studies, 2020), 335.
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